CONTACTING THE WORLDS OF EDGAR RICE BURROUGHS
J. Allen St. John and His Furniture
by William C. Wagner
Grandmaster of fantasy J. Allen St. John is best known for majestically illustrating ERB’s creation of the wildly entertaining jungle sovereign, Tarzan. He began his artistic career as a young boy. At the age of eight he traveled with his mother
to Paris to study art. His mother’s father was Hilliard Hely, an artist of considerable talent who gained most of his artistic
training in Paris. Much of St. John’s earliest and fondest memories consist of spending time with the so-called “Bohemians”
his mother gathered around her, and one of his greatest pleasures was strolling though the Louvre, the Luxembourg, and the
other countless quaint and charming corners of the city where no one but the dreamers dared to venture.
Several years later, St. John returned to the States to spend time with his father,
who seemed to have plans other than drawing for his adolescent son. When the
boy was sixteen, his father decided that he should train to become a merchant
and arranged a partnership between himself and a man with sensible experience.
Feeling as though his life was beginning to bind around him like an unwanted
cage, the headstrong teenage rebelled, and his father had no other choice than to
send him to his uncle’s ranch in California, in hopes that his son would bend his
defiant behavior towards something more constructive, like becoming a cowboy.
St. John daydreamed of the time he had spent in Paris and of how happy and content he felt simply sketching. While on a trip to Los Angeles, fate grabbed him
by the wrist when he ran into Mr. Eugene Torrey, an accomplished artist, and at
one time a student who studied at L’Ecole des Beaux-Arts, one of a number of
influential art schools in France. St. John took a chance and tossed all other prearranged plans to the wind, deciding to study art under his newly found friend for
the next three years. He toured the sights of California, gaining inspiration from
the magnificence of Yosemite and drawing and painting the old Spanish missions.
His artistic abilities advanced steadily.
It was in 1905 when publisher A. C. McClurg & Company forged a relationship with the young St. John. Their first collaboration was “The Face in the Pool.” This was a fairy tale written and illustrated by St. John which never quite worked out to
any advantage. McClurg hired him again in 1915 to provide black & white chapter headings for the second Tarzan novel,
The Return of Tarzan. The third novel of the series, The Beasts of Tarzan, featured St. John’s art for the color wraparound
dust jacket, black & white frontispiece, title page illustrations, and an additional 38 pen & ink drawings to accompany the
text. Over the next twenty years, a new Tarzan novel was produced annually featuring St. John’s art. He illustrated other
McClurg books, as well as the occasional book for Rand McNally, in addition to teaching at the Chicago Art Institute and
the American Academy of Art.
In 1980, Russ Cochran was in Chicago and visited St. John’s former studio, then occupied by Jim Romero, who gave him a
tour and showed him several St. John paintings as well as the ornate carved table and chair. After some negotiation, Cochran
purchased a large painting, as well as the ornate 1900-1910 table and chair believed to have been St. John’s writing desk.
The Gridley Wave #311 G August, 2008
Published monthly for the Burroughs Bibliophiles as a supplement to The Burroughs Bulletin. Edited by George T. McWhorter,
The Edgar Rice Burroughs Memorial Collection, William F. Ekstrom Library, University of Louisville, Louisville, KY 40292.
© Copyright 2008, The Burroughs Bibliophiles. E-mail: [email protected]. Telephone: (502) 852-8729.
The table is high oak flat-topped, with quarter-cut oak top and finger-fluted molded edge with bowed drawers in the base. The drawer at the bottom has a foliate
“C” scroll carving with large masks and sabre legs ending in claw feet, and a
center shelf to hold books. The accompanying mahogany chair has scroll-carved
ears and open carved center cartouch base, with a serpentine “X” stretcher and
carved legs. At the time of this writing (January 18, 2008), the St. John table
and chair are being auctioned by Hake’s Americana & Collectibles.
E
E
E
E
The long-awaited Paintings of J. Allen St. John book from Vanguard will premier at the San Diego Comic-Con July 24-27 and at Denvention 3, the World
Science Fiction Convention in Denver August 6-10. Authors Stephen D. Korshak and J. David Spurlock will be on hand to autograph. The bulk shipment
of the St. John book will arrive at the port of New York on July 30. Advance
orders will be mailed about a week later, and the book should be in stores
(both brick-and-mortar and online) around August 15. The genuine leatherbound, suede-slipcased, gold-gilt, limited ULTRA edition signed by the late
Jack Williamson, Danton Burroughs, and other contributors will be available exclusively from Vanguard shortly thereafter.
g G g G
Tarzan Musical Sets
Record In Holland
On March 27, 2008, Tarzan the Musical celebrated one year on stage, making it the most
successful musical in Dutch history. It won
the Studio 22 Music Award for best musical, and will open in London later this year.
The one millionth ticket has been sold, and
the cast album has gone to gold. Additional
songs were added and Chantal Janzen, the
actress playing “Jane,” received an extended
contract. Tarzan actor Ron Link (right) broke
his hand and is recuperating at home. (Reported by Ron de Laat of The Netherlands)
Left: Signet reissues a mass-market edition of
Tarzan of the Apes this month with a new introduction by Michael Meyer.
From The San Diego Reader, 2007